Chemical development, management decisions concerning

In 1970 a new set of top managers established a department dedicated to the development of new business. Its task was to rationalize the strategy of unrelated diversification by making the decisions concerning what to acquire and then overseeing their continued performance. The new areas of acquisition included at first medical systems and electronic products, and even consumer products such as deodorants and disposable diapers. Then ensued the purchasing of municipal waste systems, chemical production from coal and synthetic gas, and specialty chemicals such as motor additives and others for increasing oil-well output. 

To most practitioners who work in the day to day issues of environmental control these uncertainties are irrelevant. The decision on what constitutes an acceptable level of control for a particular substance or agent has already been made by national or international bodies. The daily task in practice is to manage the consequences. However, for some areas of activity the fact of data uncertainty is of very real concern. In the chemical business, for example, researchers develop new chemicals which have to be tested to demonstrate the point at which toxic effects occiu (most chemicals are toxic at some dose rate). Once a toxic effect is observed the precautionary principle can be applied so that environmental concentrations are 10 times to 100 times below the known effect level. This becomes the predicted no-effect concentration (PNEC). The more toxic a chemical appears, the more sensitive the species upon which the tests are performed before the precautionary principle is applied. The Notification of New Substances Regulations, dealt with in another chapter, enshrines this process in law. 

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